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<h1 class="refname">ereg</h1>
<p class="verinfo">(PHP 4, PHP 5)</p><p class="refpurpose"><span class="refname">ereg</span> — <span class="dc-title">Regular expression match</span></p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 description" id="refsect1-function.ereg-description">
<h3 class="title">Description</h3>
<div class="methodsynopsis dc-description">
<span class="type">int</span> <span class="methodname"><strong>ereg</strong></span>
( <span class="methodparam"><span class="type">string</span> <code class="parameter">$pattern</code></span>
, <span class="methodparam"><span class="type">string</span> <code class="parameter">$string</code></span>
[, <span class="methodparam"><span class="type">array</span> <code class="parameter reference">&$regs</code></span>
] )</div>
<p class="simpara">
Searches a <em><code class="parameter">string</code></em> for matches to the regular
expression given in <em><code class="parameter">pattern</code></em> in a case-sensitive
way.
</p>
<div class="warning"><strong class="warning">Warning</strong><p class="simpara">This function has been
<em class="emphasis">DEPRECATED</em> as of PHP 5.3.0. Relying on this feature is
highly discouraged.</p></div>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 parameters" id="refsect1-function.ereg-parameters">
<h3 class="title">Parameters</h3>
<p class="para">
<dl>
<dt>
<span class="term"><em><code class="parameter">pattern</code></em></span>
<dd>
<p class="para">
Case sensitive regular expression.
</p>
</dd>
</dt>
<dt>
<span class="term"><em><code class="parameter">string</code></em></span>
<dd>
<p class="para">
The input string.
</p>
</dd>
</dt>
<dt>
<span class="term"><em><code class="parameter">regs</code></em></span>
<dd>
<p class="para">
If matches are found for parenthesized substrings of
<em><code class="parameter">pattern</code></em> and the function is called with the
third argument <em><code class="parameter">regs</code></em>, the matches will be stored
in the elements of the array <em><code class="parameter">regs</code></em>.
</p>
<p class="para">
<var class="varname"><var class="varname">$regs[1]</var></var> will contain the substring which starts at
the first left parenthesis; <var class="varname"><var class="varname">$regs[2]</var></var> will contain
the substring starting at the second, and so on.
<var class="varname"><var class="varname">$regs[0]</var></var> will contain a copy of the complete string
matched.
</p>
</dd>
</dt>
</dl>
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 returnvalues" id="refsect1-function.ereg-returnvalues">
<h3 class="title">Return Values</h3>
<p class="para">
Returns the length of the matched string if a match for
<em><code class="parameter">pattern</code></em> was found in <em><code class="parameter">string</code></em>,
or <strong><code>FALSE</code></strong> if no matches were found or an error occurred.
</p>
<p class="para">
If the optional parameter <em><code class="parameter">regs</code></em> was not passed or
the length of the matched string is 0, this function returns 1.
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 changelog" id="refsect1-function.ereg-changelog">
<h3 class="title">Changelog</h3>
<p class="para">
<table class="doctable informaltable">
<thead>
<tr>
<th>Version</th>
<th>Description</th>
</tr>
</thead>
<tbody class="tbody">
<tr>
<td>4.1.0</td>
<td>
Up to (and including) PHP 4.1.0 <var class="varname"><var class="varname">$regs</var></var> will be
filled with exactly ten elements, even though more or fewer than
ten parenthesized substrings may actually have matched. This has
no effect on <span class="function"><strong>ereg()</strong></span>'s ability to match more
substrings. If no matches are found, <em>$regs</em>
will not be altered by <span class="function"><strong>ereg()</strong></span>.
</td>
</tr>
</tbody>
</table>
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 examples" id="refsect1-function.ereg-examples">
<h3 class="title">Examples</h3>
<p class="para">
<div class="example" id="example-4809">
<p><strong>Example #1 <span class="function"><strong>ereg()</strong></span> example</strong></p>
<div class="example-contents"><p>
The following code snippet takes a date in ISO format (YYYY-MM-DD) and
prints it in DD.MM.YYYY format:
</p></div>
<div class="example-contents">
<div class="phpcode"><code><span style="color: #000000">
<span style="color: #0000BB"><?php<br /></span><span style="color: #007700">if (</span><span style="color: #0000BB">ereg </span><span style="color: #007700">(</span><span style="color: #DD0000">"([0-9]{4})-([0-9]{1,2})-([0-9]{1,2})"</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date</span><span style="color: #007700">, </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$regs</span><span style="color: #007700">)) {<br /> echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$regs</span><span style="color: #007700">[</span><span style="color: #0000BB">3</span><span style="color: #007700">]</span><span style="color: #DD0000">.</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$regs</span><span style="color: #007700">[</span><span style="color: #0000BB">2</span><span style="color: #007700">]</span><span style="color: #DD0000">.</span><span style="color: #0000BB">$regs</span><span style="color: #007700">[</span><span style="color: #0000BB">1</span><span style="color: #007700">]</span><span style="color: #DD0000">"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br />} else {<br /> echo </span><span style="color: #DD0000">"Invalid date format: </span><span style="color: #0000BB">$date</span><span style="color: #DD0000">"</span><span style="color: #007700">;<br />}<br /></span><span style="color: #0000BB">?></span>
</span>
</code></div>
</div>
</div>
</p>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 notes" id="refsect1-function.ereg-notes">
<h3 class="title">Notes</h3>
<blockquote class="note"><p><strong class="note">Note</strong>: <p class="para">As of PHP 5.3.0, the
regex extension is deprecated in favor of the
<a href="book.pcre.html" class="link">PCRE extension</a>. Calling this function
will issue an <strong><code>E_DEPRECATED</code></strong> notice. See <a href="reference.pcre.pattern.posix.html" class="link">the list of
differences</a> for help on converting to PCRE.</p></p></blockquote>
<div class="tip"><strong class="tip">Tip</strong>
<p class="para">
<span class="function"><strong>ereg()</strong></span> is deprecated as of PHP 5.3.0. <span class="function"><a href="function.preg-match.html" class="function">preg_match()</a></span>
is the suggested alternative to this function.
</p>
</div>
</div>
<div class="refsect1 seealso" id="refsect1-function.ereg-seealso">
<h3 class="title">See Also</h3>
<p class="para">
<ul class="simplelist">
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.eregi.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">eregi()</a> - Case insensitive regular expression match</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.ereg-replace.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">ereg_replace()</a> - Replace regular expression</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.eregi-replace.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">eregi_replace()</a> - Replace regular expression case insensitive</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.preg-match.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">preg_match()</a> - Perform a regular expression match</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.strpos.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">strpos()</a> - Find the position of the first occurrence of a substring in a string</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.strstr.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">strstr()</a> - Find the first occurrence of a string</span></li>
<li class="member"> <span class="function"><a href="function.quotemeta.html" class="function" rel="rdfs-seeAlso">quotemeta()</a> - Quote meta characters</span></li>
</ul>
</p>
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